


Na Fionnachtana

by HunterPeverell



Series: A Chuisle Mo Chroí [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Aromantic, Asexual Bucky Barnes, Asexual Steve Rogers, Growing Up, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-23
Updated: 2016-10-23
Packaged: 2018-08-24 05:44:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8359447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HunterPeverell/pseuds/HunterPeverell
Summary: Steve just thought he was a late bloomer.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: The title means “The Discovery.” Wherein Steve discovers asexuality and Bucky does, too.
> 
> This story openly discusses their orientations and how they feel. I use terms to describe various aspects of asexuality and aromanticism. Please remember that I'm not writing for everyone--This story is drawn heavily from my own experiences. If you see anything you don't like, please be respectful and leave a comment if you've a mind to.
> 
> This is for onethingconstant, who kicked my arse in gear so I got this posted.

Steve always figured he was different.

For one thing, he had two (somewhat) working eyes and two (somewhat) working ears and he saw how his classmates acted and heard what his classmates said. Every movie he went to, from action-packed ones like the A-Team when he was seventeen to the third Shrek movie when he was fourteen all dabbled in this emotion he couldn’t understand.

“I don’t know how to love,” he told his ma once, when he was fifteen and left behind again by Bucky who was going out on a date with his very first boyfriend.

“What? Steve, baby, no,” his ma said, wrapping him up in a hug. Steve tugged away after a second, embarrassed though it was only them in the apartment. His mother let him, a small smile gracing her thin lips.

“Don’t ever think that,” she continued. “I haven’t ever met a more loving boy than you.”

“But I don’t feel like my other classmates,” Steve protested. “They’re all—they’re all kissing and touching and falling in love…”

“Falling in lust is more like it,” his ma corrected. “Steve, there’s more than one kind of love, you know? You love me, right?”

“Yeah…” Steve said.

“You love Bucky,” she continued. Steve blinked. “You can love your friends,” she said. “You can, Steve. You love Bucky.”

“Yeah.” Steve nodded, a small bob of his head.

“You love,” his ma said. “I ain’t ever seen a heart as big as yours, a leanbh. It’s so big, and you fill it right up. I ever tell you I didn’t feel like my peers until I was a senior?”

Steve’s eyes grew wide. “No.”

His ma laughed. “Well, I didn’t. Didn’t meet your da until a few years after that, but boy, throughout high school I was wondering the exact same things you were. You’ll get there, Steve. You’re just a bit late, and there ain’t no shame in that.”

Steve held onto that all throughout high school, thinking that as soon as senior year came, he’d feel just like everyone else did, just like his ma.

He waited and waited, but then, in September, his ma caught pneumonia and couldn’t shake it. When they took her to the hospital, the doctors discovered she had late-stage breast cancer. There was little to nothing they could do.

After that, feeling like everyone else didn’t seem as important.

****

The night air was warm, musky with the scents of city life, gasoline and smog. Bucky walked next to him, steady as always, carrying a plastic shopping bag where Steve had stuffed his cap, gown, and diploma. Bucky’s parents had taken his own attire with them in their car, and Steve and Bucky were wearing their usual garb of jeans and ratty t-shirts. Bucky favored combat boots and Steve banged up tennis shoes, but their footsteps were well-matched in the darkened city.

A lot of people were out, despite the late hour. Bucky glared at anyone who so much looked in Steve’s direction, and Steve was too amused by it to tell him to stop. He bumped his shoulder into Bucky’s bicep when Bucky practically growled at a passerby.

“Calm down,” he said.

Huffing, Bucky ducked his head. His hair was getting a little long—Steve knew he’d soon cut it—so it fell into his face. Steve, however, could see the curve of his lips, smiling Bucky’s special soft smile.

The last few blocks were walked in companionable silence. Bucky swung his arms, almost glowing with satisfaction with the twelve years of school behind him. Steve had shoved his hands in his pockets, his blonde hair flopping against his forehead.

“Well then,” Bucky said, pausing in front of Steve’s apartment complex. “You ready for college?”

Steve shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.” He held his hand out for the bag and instead Bucky bent his head down so that it hovered near Steve. “Bucky?”

“Can I kiss you?” Bucky asked.

Steve nodded, a tilt of his head that was barely there. His heart beat a little faster in his chest. Bucky kept eye contact as he leaned in and kissed Steve. Steve’s eyes fluttered shut, but there weren’t any of the fireworks Bucky had described. It was just warm and soft and slightly wet and Steve enjoyed it. He opened his eyes to watch Bucky, who pulled away and blinked a couple of times. There was something about his face—Steve thought Bucky looked crestfallen.

“Sorry,” Bucky murmured, grimacing as he drew away. He forced a grin at Steve. “Seemed appropriate. I know you ain’t… into that.”

“Ma said I’m a late bloomer,” Steve whispered, staring up at Bucky.

Bucky snorted. With his free hand, he slowly lowered his fingers to Steve’s face. Steve didn’t protest, and Bucky stroked the delicate skin along the corners of his eyes. “You believe that?”

“Not anymore,” Steve admitted. “What’s it like? Feeling… what everyone else feels.”

Bucky tried to smile, but it looked sad and broken. “I don’t know.”

Steve nodded and looked down for a moment before resolutely looking back up and meeting Bucky’s gaze. “I’m not broken.”

“I know you ain’t,” Bucky said.

Steve leaned into Bucky, taking comfort in his warmth and his familiar body. “You ain’t, either, Buck.”

He heard Bucky suck in a sharp breath.

“I tried,” Bucky said, and it sounded like he was about to cry. “I tried so hard, Stevie. My dad always wanted me to be normal, and he was real good ‘bout the bisexual thing, y’know? But he wouldn’t… he doesn’t… I don’t feel all that, he he’d never understand.”

Steve felt like he ought to be more indignant that Bucky flirted his way through high school without ever feeling what he promised those girls and boys he felt, but all he could muster up was a deep, aching sadness for the boy before him, who was the most important person in his life.

“It’ll be okay,” he said. “I got—I got something I wanna show you.”

He led Bucky upstairs to the crappy computer and turned it on. He pulled up Google and typed in _asexual._

****

“People are sayin’ we’re in a relationship,” Bucky murmured, his breath soft against the shell of Steve’s ear. They were huddled over the computer a few hours later—Bucky had called his parents; told them he’d be late getting home—and they had migrated from sitting a little way apart to pressed right up against each other. Steve, eyes drooping, had rested his head on Bucky’s shoulder and Bucky barely spoke above a whisper.

“I know,” Steve said. “We haven’t really talked about it. Are you the same? Do you—does this stuff feel like you feel? Or—describe it?”

Bucky shuddered, then grew still. “Yeah.”

“But the dates—”

“I thought I was broken,” Bucky mumbled. “Fake it ‘til you make it, right? I thought—I ain’t ever loved anyone as much as you, Stevie. I thought, earlier, it’d be like True Love’s kiss or some shit, where I’d get fixed. Instead I’m just… Fuck, Steve. We ain’t accepted anywhere.”

“It pisses me off,” Steve admitted. “When I read that I… Fuck, Bucky. When I read that I was _pissed_. People not writing well-known characters as ace ‘cause we’re ‘boring’? Who the fuck even says that? It’s just … It’s so frustrating.”

“I know,” Bucky said solemnly. “That’s why we need to find an island to live on. We’ll call it Aceland.” Steve didn’t crack a smile, just huffed out a breath of air he knew Bucky would understand was a laugh. Bucky continued, his voice dropping to a mumble, his face pressing into Steve’s shoulder, 

“I’ll go where you go. Fuck everyone else.”

“Yeah,” Steve said. “You ‘n’ me, right?”

“Of course,” Bucky said, and it warmed Steve up, hearing that. It sounded like Bucky had nowhere else he’d rather be than at Steve’s side.

Steve looked at the world, and he saw people in love, falling in love, loving love.

He loved Bucky, he knew that with all of his heart. He just didn’t know why it had to be the kind of love the world all but demanded for it to be real.

This, here, with Bucky wrapped around him, his hot breath ghosting his ear and mussing his hair, staring at the bright white screen when the world is soft and dark around them, how could Steve want anything else?

Bucky breathed, his breath soft even so close to Steve’s good ear. “What do you like the best? The labels we’ve found?”

“Asexual,” Steve replied. “Grey-romantic.”

“Grey?” Bucky asked, surprised. “Which part?”

Steve lifted his finger to the screen, trailing it down one of the definitions. “‘Desire relationships which are not quite platonic and not quite romantic.’ You?”

Bucky ducked his head down to the crook of Steve neck. His breath played across Steve’s nape. “Aromanic,” Bucky mumbled. “Aromantic.”

“Okay,” Steve said. “What do you wanna do about it?”

Bucky wrapped his arm around Steve’s waist. This wasn’t how either of them expected to spend their graduation night, but Steve’s glad they are.

“I like holding your hand,” Bucky admitted. “I like kissing you and cuddling you. But I don’t really wanna do anything else. I love being your friend.”

“Me too,” Steve said, resting his cheek against Bucky’s head and placing his hands on top of Bucky’s. “I’m fine with those things, too.”

“Really?” Bucky’s voice was muffled. “It’s okay?”

“Yeah,” Steve said, rubbing his thumb over Bucky’s pulse point. “We’ll kiss and cuddle and hold hands, but we’re best friends and I wouldn’t wanna have it any other way.”

He felt Bucky smile, a curve of the lips against Steve’s neck. “I love you.”

“I know,” Steve whispered. “I love you, too.”

****

Later that night, after hours of reading, they curled up against one another in the dark. Bucky’s family hadn’t been happy when Bucky had called again, this time to say he was going to stay with Steve for the night—they had apparently wanted to throw him a party—but there was little they could do.

Steve’s twin bed barely fit the both of them, but they made it work. Bucky’s hand stroked Steve’s back, soothing.

“They don’t teach this stuff in school,” Steve whispered finally, letting Bucky into his thoughts. “Why don’t they teach this stuff?”

“I don’t know,” Bucky replied, just as quiet.

The apartment was a place of quiet. Of death. The silent ghost of his mother lingered in these walls, and Steve’s heart ached at the thought.

He sucked in a breath and drew a flower on Bucky’s inner wrist with his index finger. When that did little to derail his train of thought, he twisted his head so that it was buried in Bucky’s shoulder. “Bucky?”

“Yeah?”

Steve leaned back and looked Bucky in the eye, trying to make his voice and expression as sincere as possible. “You aren’t broken.”

Bucky’s expression was heartbreaking. It was relief and hope and fear and love, the kind of love Steve had never seen before.

And it was _for_ Steve.

“How can I be, when I got you?” Bucky whispered.

Steve grinned despite himself. “Sap.”

Bucky laced their fingers together. “You and me, Steve.”

“We’re not broken,” Steve said, even though he had never felt broken. Just left behind. Just a late bloomer.

“No,” Bucky breathed his agreement, and they fell asleep with their fingers still twisted together.

They weren’t broken. They would never want sex, though they would try it time to time. But sex was physical, and what they had, their love?

Steve never wanted anything else.

**Author's Note:**

> Here’s the thing: There is more to the Ace community than aro/aces. Asexuals can have romantic orientations that fall outside of aromanticism and likewise aros aren’t explicitly ace. This one-shot was partly inspired by The Stucky Library post here: http://thestuckylibrary.tumblr.com/post/146461050342/queer-platonic-relationships-qpr-is-a-tern-that
> 
> So while I myself am on the aro/ace spectrum, this series didn’t originally have aro/ace Steve and Bucky (I picture Bucky as panromantic and Steve as biromantic, but I really don’t care how you guys view them) but that’s what this story explores. Feel free to continue reading the other one-shots as them both being just aces and full romantics or whatever it is you like, but for this one-shot, this one here that you are reading, they’re aro/ace.


End file.
